


Lazarus

by alinewrites



Category: Oz (TV)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-04-14
Updated: 2012-04-14
Packaged: 2017-11-03 15:33:41
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,974
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/383017
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/alinewrites/pseuds/alinewrites
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Keller is dead. Beecher knows that. But who's this man, then? And what is Sister Pete thinking about, trying to convince him that he's Keller?<br/>Post Season 6</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lazarus

“Sit down, Tobias. We have to talk.”

Toby glanced briefly at the frail woman standing in front of him in her grey cardigan and skirt, noticing the way she buried her hands in her pockets, her gentle smile, her look of compassion and worry.

Bad. He knew from experience that this look meant trouble.

“How are you feeling these days, Tobias?” she asked softly.

He thought of the work at the library, the number of books he had not registered yet, how he'd rather be down there working than here for one of those useless sessions. “Rather well, I guess. Considering…”

When he did not finish, she sighed, looking down at her hands pensively.

“Come on, Sister. What's wrong? It’s not like I still have something to lose. You can tell me.”

Her silence frightened him. Silence was worse than yelling; just like loneliness was worse than bad company. Toby had learned this unpleasant truth lately, talking to someone who was not here any longer, someone who would never be here again. He had tried to explain his feelings to the haunting shadow, until he was so worried about his own sanity that he just wrote down his thoughts on a small notebook and hid it in the same place he always used as a safe hiding place.

“Chris Keller is coming back to Oz, Tobias,” Sister Pete said with infinite patience. “His wounds are now healed.”

Toby’s laugh sounded brittle. “Please, sister! It’s not funny.”

“No, indeed, Tobias, it’s not. I am not delighted at the prospect, you can trust me.”

At that point Toby had to consider that she was serious and hence, completely mad. “Sister,” he said with the same patience she had shown, wondering if he should call the guard. “Chris Keller is dead. I killed him”

She shook her head, coming to sit in front of him on the old worn armchair. “No, Toby. Chris Keller is alive and as well as he can be, and he-is-coming-back.”

Toby snorted. “Sister, Chris is dead. I saw him dead. I saw his eyes – dead. And when they took him away; and when we talked about him later, about the fact that he died because of me…”

She sighed. “Those moments you remember never happened, Toby. Only in your mind. Keller was carried away on a gurney and he was unconscious. You were thrown into solitary before I had time to talk to you and you trapped yourself in the delusion that he was dead. Invented memories of a death no one ever mentioned to you.”

He shook his head. “No. No,” he said getting up, seeing the guard glance inside in worry and refraining from punching anything – the wall, the door, fuck, the guard himself. For a second he even wished to be dragged back into solitary where it was dark and cold and lonely and where the world was the way he wanted it to be. The way it should be. “I don’t believe it. It can’t be. Sister…” He turned to her and she looked up, smiling.

“Tobias, I am worried. I wish we could talk about this a little longer. Keller’s return is going to be a difficult moment for you and if you go on hiding away from the truth....”

If he clung to his own truth hard enough he would stay sane, Toby thought. “There’s nothing to talk about, Sister. Chris Keller won’t be back because he’s dead and no one comes back from the dead as far as I know. Now please, I have to go.”

She got up as well and walked to him, resting her bony hands on his shoulders. “Tobias, believe me, you are deluding yourself. Denying what happened is the way your mind devised to get you out of a situation with too much guilt for you to take. Please, listen to me.”

Toby got up and knocked on the door. The hack came in. “I have to go back to work,” Toby said in a clipped tone. The guard nodded and glanced at Pete for confirmation.

“It's all right, he can go,” she said. And to Beecher, “I'll see you again on Wednesday.”

All the way to the library he was shaking, his ears buzzing, his stomach churning. Chris is dead. I know he is.

Working on the books soothed his mind; he decided to forget the disturbing conversation for now. Later at the cafeteria, he sat in front of O’Reilly. The Mick gave him a cursory glance. “You look like shit warmed over, Beecher,” he said.

“Yeah, thanks, O’Reilly. Did you hear the rumor?”

O’Reilly frowned, his eyes shining with interest. “Which one?”

“The one about Keller coming back to Em City?”

O’Reilly leaned back, smiling. “Oh, that one. Why? Are you scared that he could be a little pissed off at you, Beecher?”

“Don’t be stupid. Keller’s dead.”

There was something akin to compassion in O’Reilly’s eyes now and Beecher hated it. His own gaze hardened, giving him the mad look that didn’t fit his clean cut look, cute nose and general tidiness. O’Reilly knew that look too well to insist.

“If you say so, Beecher,” he said, grabbing his tray and getting up. “If you fucking say so.”

Beecher watched him go and shivered. Ok, so he might be one of the only sane people left here. Or maybe O’Reilly was just yanking his chain. Who knew? During the day, he broached the matter again with Rebadow and others he considered as friends. Well, whatever that word meant here, of course. None of them had ever heard of Chris’ death; all of them had heard the news of his return. Back in his cell, where he was alone these days, Toby wondered if he had fallen into the twilight zone; everyone had gone mad and he was the only one who knew the truth. At least, he thought, the future would prove him right, since Keller would of course never come back.

The certainty was easy to cling to during the day; he did not oppose Sister Pete during their next session, just smiled and nodded and listened like the good guy she still thought he was. O’Reilly, like everyone else, looked pretty relieved that he did not broach the subject again. All in all, the days went well and the work of course kept him sane.

Nights were another story. Darkness shattered his convictions, sowing doubt in his troubled mind: what if Keller was indeed alive? What if he did come back, wanting revenge? No; it could not be. He could not have imagined those dreadful moments when they had taken the dead body away, O’Reilly’s and Murphy’s accusing looks... And what about the long conversation in the maze with Sister Pete? Had it all been a dream as well? He knew it had happened. It must have happened or else…

The prospect was terrifying.

Nights were long and days very short in comparison; too short to hold on to certainties he was the only one to have.

“If I am delusional and Chris… Chris is alive, why am I feeling like I’m perfectly sane?” he asked Sister Pete one day at the library.

“You are sane, Tobias. I can confirm that. You show no sign of delirium or psychosis - except when it comes to Chris Keller, obviously.” She dared a small smile. “Does that mean you’re coming to terms with the feeling that he is alive?”

Toby shrugged, rubbing his face with his hands, trying to get rid of the doubts and the fear. “Right now the mere thought of it sounds crazy but sometimes…”

She dragged a chair and sat in front of the desk, very close to Toby. Some inmates looked at her curiously above their books. “Just for the sake of discussion, Toby,” she said, “Let’s admit that Chris Keller is alive. How do you feel about the prospect of seeing him again?”

A simple sentence, something so innocent… Toby looked at Sister Pete and his mind went completely blank. He saw her frown in worry; her mouth opened – then a thick sickening darkness swallowed him and the world around him faded.

:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-:-

“You’re asking me to write a letter to Toby? What the fuck does that mean, Sister? What have I done this time?”

Having Keller sitting close to her, his legs stretched in front of him, looking bored, felt exactly like it had felt so many times before, Pete thought. Oppressive. Like he was absorbing all the oxygen in the room, leaving her breathless. Apart from a limp, Keller looked fine. After more than a year in a hospital he barely looked older, maybe leaner and somewhat drawn. Only in his eyes did she catch some weariness, like something had been finally broken. For a second she wondered if he would still be able to survive in Oz after what had happened. This is Chris Keller, she berated herself, and he will survive one way or another.

“Toby seems to be under the misconception that you are dead. He is actually quite convinced that he killed you and when we broached the subject of your comeback, he just… passed out.”

Keller’s trademark smirk. “How good it feels to be so warmly welcome.”

“Please, Chris. He is unable to face the fact that you are still alive; some of it obviously has to do with the guilt he feels. I want you to write a letter to convince him…”

Chris rose swiftly and winced at the pain. “No.” he said. “Not again. I won’t write your fucking letter. I’m fed up with this bullshit. I’m no fucking baby-sitter for poor little traumatized Toby. As far as I’m concerned, he can stay in a coma for the rest of his life; I don’t give a fucking fly.”

He got up, walked to the door and pushed it open, heedless of the young new hack who looked at him in alarm. “Let’s go,” Keller said.

Pete leaned back against her chair, pensive. Fine. Let’s see what he really does about it. The thought made her smile.

:-:--:-:-:-:

“Cut the bullshit, Toby, and come back. I miss you. I’ll be good. Or as bad as you want. It’s full of people I don’t know, Fuck, Toby, I’m bored to hell. I need you.”

Two lines – not really a letter. No envelope, just the back of a white paper torn from a register in the storage room, and that O’Reily slipped into Beecher’s hand while taking away his tray and giving him a meaningful look.

Toby waited until he was alone – as alone as he would ever be here—or at least shielded from the guards. He rose on an elbow, waiting until the dizziness went away. For a second he thought of pulling out the IV that kept pouring out drugs into his system. He had tried to tell them, tell Dr Nathan that he was feeling better, that they could stop sedating him, that he was ready to accept the truth. After a long phone call to Sister Pete, she had decided against it and now he was feeling weak as well as nauseous. He looked at the folded paper with his name on it. Just by that he knew who it was from. No one in Oz but Chris ever called him Toby. He sighed. Time to face reality now. If it was a joke, he’d know. If it was not… He read the short note. God, the man wrote like a dog; who aside from Toby could ever decipher his scrawl? But the tone, imperious and childish, selfish and needy, ambiguous and hopeful, was solely Chris’. Fuck. He was alive. Toby stared at the note until he felt too tired to go on. He slipped it under his pillow, letting sleep engulf him, and dreamt of being out with his daughter, as usual. You only dream of things that will never happen, Chris used to say.

There was another note the next day: the food was worse than Chris remembered, he hated being alone in a cell, some Aryan wannabe had tried to fuck with him. The cocksucker would not be able to walk for a while. They had changed the washing machine; they didn’t work and shit when would he come back?

Toby thought there would be another note; Keller was not the kind to give up easily. Instead of that he woke up from a nap one day to find Chris sitting on a chair beside his bed, watching him.

“So,” Chris said after a minute of silent staring. “Do I look like a fucking ghost?”

Toby closed his eyes. Moving his arm he realized that the IV was gone. Must be a good sign.

“I never saw a ghost before. How would I know?”

That earned him a genuine Keller smile. Shit, he had forgotten the power of that smile. Turning his head he saw Gloria Nathan and Sister Pete watching them from the other side of the room, looking slightly worried. The other patients were trying their best to look away; one of them, who was staring a little too much, paled under Keller’s cold gaze.

Then Keller took Toby’s hand, his gaze never leaving Toby’s eyes, and he pressed it against his stubbly cheek, down to his mouth. His breath was hot and wet against Toby’s palm. “It’s me, Toby. Fuck, I couldn’t even manage to die properly.”

Toby looked at him coolly. “I don’t remember us parting on such loving terms,” he said, pulling out his hand

But it would take more to disturb Keller. “I would not know. I seem to have forgotten a lot of what happened during the few days before my attempt at flying. You will have to explain it to me again.”

“You fucking bastard. Don’t you dare play this game with me!”

Keller smiled again, a slow, creeping, seducing smile. “What? You don’t believe me? I’m hurt, Toby.”

After he left, Toby turned to look at Sister Pete; before she turned away he caught a look of relief on her face. So. Probably the reunion had gone relatively well.

The following day, Toby was sent back to his pod. “You’ll still have to take some of these,” Dr Nathan had told him before letting him go, showing him a box of pills. “We would not want you to pass out again.”

Of course Chris was waiting for him. It always seemed incredible that there would be no other cell available than his own for Chris in the whole prison. Or maybe someone had thought it would be good for both of them; some sort of touching reunion - bullshit. “Don’t be so paranoid, Beecher,” Murphy told him. “It’s just that Em’city’s crowded these days.”

Toby snorted and shook his head. “Yeah, sure.”

It seemed to have become a tradition of sort to come back to his once empty pod and find Chris lying on the lower bunk reading some magazine – although it was a book this time, probably borrowed from the library.

“The librarian sucks,” Chris said, watching as Toby took possession of his stuff again – it became a habit after some years to check everything; make sure no one had stolen one of your few possessions. “Not the way I like it.”

“Well I don't suck,” Toby said, “either way.”

Chris stretched. “I know.” He pulled something from under the pillow. “I found this. I read it.”

Fuck, Toby thought, paling. Never hide something in a place someone already knows about, especially if the someone is Chris Keller. “What about this little thing called privacy?” he asked, snatching the notebook from Chris.

Chris sat up, throwing his legs over the mattress. “Yeah, I know about that one. This thing we haven’t had a fucking second of since we met, right? But... What you write about us, about me... It hurt, Toby.”

“Truth tends to hurt,” Toby said, sitting by his side, not too close – Chris was after all a dangerous unpredictable animal.

“Yeah. I can't promise much – you know me too well. But I won't try and drag you into something you don't want and I'll try to be... civilized. Y'know, as much as I can be. What I mean is... I'm fucking glad to be back. And I'd rather have you on your own terms than not at all. Is that OK?”

Toby turned, scrutinizing the expression on Chris' solemn face for a moment. “Yeah. Fine with me.”

Chris nodded and got up, wincing at the pain in his back. “So, Beecher. Tell me... What's new here?”

And while Chris listened to the rumors, new habits, new hacks, new guys, Toby would have sworn he was already devising a plan to have him back – on his own terms.

Well that would be interesting, Toby thought. Life in Oz was boring and they had all the time they could ask for. No hope for immediate freedom, no one else to cherish, Toby’s only prospect the monthly visits with his mother and daughter. He looked at Chris’ mouth and his eyes and his lean body and sighed. Whatever would make the time pass more quickly was welcome, as long as it did not endanger his own life.

When Chris walked back to his bed, his hip brushed against Toby’s shoulder a little too long - probably intentionally. Toby didn’t even move, just lowered his eyes before climbing back on his bed.

“Toby?” Chris said later, when the lights were out.

“Yeah?”

“Never thought a fucking fish tank among other fish tanks full of sharks would feel so fucking good just because you’re in it with me.” Chris said, yawning.

Toby smiled in the darkness. “Yeah. Good night Chris.” And after a moment he added, “Welcome back.”

But of course, Chris was already asleep.


End file.
